text:
When Herman Rockefeller was killed in 2010, his parallel lives - as family man, lover and secret swinger - collided. Now a line has finally been drawn beneath his sad and dark story, with his New Zealand-born wife, Vicky, agreeing to share some of his A$14 million ($18.2 million) fortune with his long-time mistress, Liza Horsfall.
Horsfall had sued Rockefeller's widow for a chunk of his estate after a Melbourne couple were jailed last year for the manslaughter of the 52-year-old businessman, the former chief financial officer of Brierley Investments.
Mario Schembri and Bernadette Denny, who met him through a magazine advertisement, beat him to death during a swingers' tryst, then dismembered him and burned his remains.
Details of the out-of-court settlement are confidential, but local media said Horsfall - who, like Vicky, claimed to know nothing about Rockefeller's private life as a swinger - would receive a six-figure sum. She had been in a 27-year relationship with the US-born property developer, she had told the Victorian Supreme Court.
On the surface, Rockefeller - whose family moved from Ohio to Geelong, Victoria, when he was a teenager - was a model citizen, with a wife, two children and a successful business. But the keen churchgoer not only had a mistress, but a taste for sex with strangers - separate lives he juggled with the help of five mobile phones, police learned.
Harvard-educated Rockefeller met his wife while working in New Zealand, where he was a director of Carter Holt Harvey in the early 1990s. He later moved to Brierley, before returning to Melbourne with his family in 2000.
At the trial of Schembri and Denny, the jury heard Rockefeller placed 34 ads in swingers' magazines between 2000 and his fateful second meeting with Schembri, a scrap metal hauler, and Denny in January 2010.
The couple were infuriated when he turned up to see them without a female partner, and a fight broke out, during which he was punched repeatedly and died of his injuries.
Schembri told police: "He come over and he didn't bring his missus and there was a bit of a confrontation. With his kind of money he could have bought a bloody whorehouse or whatever, but yet he chose to come to us. He betrayed us and then he pushed that button."
Gruesome details of the disposal of his body emerged during the trial. Schembri used a chainsaw to dismember Rockefeller; he then burned his remains in a 44-gallon drum in a friend's backyard, before burying his bones.
The judge accepted the couple's manslaughter plea, jailing Schembri for a minimum of seven years and Denny for a minimum of five.


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I don't want to be anything other than what I've been trying to be lately
"Is this.. is this the OC? I've lost track. It's all so mind-numbing."
This popular catchphrase comes from the TV show One Tree Hill. Anyone remember One Tree Hill? No? It was like the OC, but it had basketball in it. Actually, that may be the only difference. Hold on a second, surely network executives can't just be making copies of mindless teen dramas and passing them off onto the unsuspecting public? This can't be right!
- 1 One Tree Hill
- 2 The emOC
- 3 Characters
- 3.1 Ryan "Outsider" Atwood
- 3.2 Seth "So F*cking Annoying" Cohen
- 3.3 Marissa "Coop" Cooper
- 3.4 Summer "Airhead Bitch" Roberts
- 3.5 Kirsten "Count Drunkula" Cohen
- 3.6 Sandy
- 3.7 Julie "Busty" Cooper-Nichol-Townsend-Atwood-Roberts-Liberty
- 3.8 Luke "Dad's Gay" Ward
- 3.9 Lucas "Total Ryan Rip-off" Scott
- 3.10 Dawson "Up Sh*t Creek" Leery
- 4 Mistakes
One Tree Hill[edit]
One Tree Hill chronicles the high school adventures of Ryan, Seth, Marissa and Summer as they burn down houses, shoot each other, rape each other and experiment with lesbianism. Initially popular among Fox's coveted 'IQ under 75' demographic, the show subsequently did poorly, and resorted to killing one of its main characters every season finale. After lasting for an agonising 11 seasons, the show was finally axed by Fox, though all twenty of its loyal fans prefer to think of it as being "put down". The show had two spin-offs. The first featured a minor character named Dawson who always got himself into trouble, and was instantly recognisable by his catchphrase "now I'm really up sh*t creek without a paddle". The show was appropriately named Dawson's Creek. The other spin-off followed ex-actor Joey Triviani as he moved to Beverly Hills. This spin-off was named Beverly Hills 90210, because this is the number of years it feels like the show has been on for. Two further spin-offs, One Tree Hill: Miami and One Tree Hill: NY are in the planning stages.
The emOC[edit]
The first series of The OC was originally titled The emOC, designed to appeal to the My Chemical Romance generation. However, after MCR sued Fox for infringement of copyright, claiming they had invented emo, the series name was changed, because the greedy capitalist fatcats didn't want to pay a cent. Many (and by that I mean 3, or 30% of the total) fans agree that these episodes are much better than the later series, containing superior acting. The soundtracks, however, leave much to be desired, featuring mainly Imogen Heap and Alkaline Trio.
There are several interesting facts about this series of One Tree Hill (which consisted of five three-hour-long episodes). For example, Ryan's unchanging facial expression was maintained by botox. This changed in later episodes, as the RSPCA complained it was cruelty to dumb animals. After this, he had to resort to bad acting to keep up appearances. Other facts to note include the homoerotic subtext between Marissa and the drainpipes in the area. The actress playing Marissa was replaced for Season 2, as her eyebrows were distracting the cameramen, and she kept being mistaken for Sandy, the family's owl. Sandy himself was eaten by Summer in Season 5 when she developed bulimia and needed a quick protein fix.
"Ryan doesn't seem to say much"
Ryan "Outsider" Atwood[edit]
Ryan comes from a 'rough area' and as such speaks in monosyllables, has only one set of clothes, regularly participates in cage fights and doesn't get on with those snobby rich kids. His life picks up after he joins Newport's basketball team, the Dodos. He has relationships with most of the female cast, except Summer, who only goes out with horses.
Seth "So F*cking Annoying" Cohen[edit]
Seth Cohen was just an ordinary boy until he was bitten by a radioactive emo, at which point he developed amazing powers of self-absorbed depression and introspection. Armed only with his deck of Magic: The Gathering cards, he now fights evil and the status quo as Emo Lad.
Marissa "Coop" Cooper[edit]
Marissa is famous in the series for dating Ryan, having no personality of her own. Marissa has suffered greatly over the course of the series. First, she overdosed on Smarties while vacationing in Mexico, at which point she was almost raped by three Mexicans and Princess Sparkle. Next, she developed an alcohol addiction resulting in a chemical imbalance that caused her to periodically throw pool loungers at her stepmother in a spastic manner. She has died no less than seven times in various car accidents and earthquakes. After her death in Season 27, the whole of Seasons 27-33 were revealed to be a dream experienced by Summer.
Summer "Airhead Bitch" Roberts[edit]
Summer is a stereotypical cheerleader type, who bizzarely dates an emo (Seth), after discovering his secret identity. However, Seth's continuous pop culture references caused her brain to overload, so for the last few Seasons it was replaced by the central processing unit of Knight Rider, and Summer thus spent the time with David Hasselhoff inside her fighting crime bosses who could be conveniently stopped by a car.
Ryan, Seth, Marissa and Summer are known as the 'gruesome foursome' in honour of their sexual proclivities.
Kirsten "Count Drunkula" Cohen[edit]
Kirsten does nothing all day accept make dinner and drink like a fish, often at the same time. After she went into rehab, Ryan and Seth almost starved to death.
Sandy is the family's pet owl, famous because his eyebrows could be seen from space. He was, sadly, eaten by Summer, who was bulimic and craved protein.
Julie "Busty" Cooper-Nichol-Townsend-Atwood-Roberts-Liberty[edit]
Julie is the series' "tart with a heart". She has been married to every major character in the series, as well as several animals and major landmarks, such as the Statue of Liberty.
Luke "Dad's Gay" Ward[edit]
Luke, it has been established, has no brain cells, relying on photosynthesis to power his movement. As "the jock we all love to hate", he dated Marissa briefly, but left her after discovering she was an octopus. Luke exited the series after everyone in Newport found out his Dad was gay. They moved to Portland, where no-one would notice.
Lucas "Total Ryan Rip-off" Scott[edit]
Lucas is extremely similar to Ryan Atwood. So similar, in fact, that several fans consider them to be the same person. Constantly surrounded by his basketball groupies (who all had odd names like Skills, Mouth, Whitey, Nose, Tonsils and Gout) Lucas was fazed out of One Tree Hill and starred in his own series, The OC. This show was sadly cancelled due to nobody caring. Its writers were sued for plagiarism, but the case was thrown out of court when it became unclear just who was sueing whom. And something about a wombat.
Dawson "Up Sh*t Creek" Leery[edit]
Dawson, a minor character in the show, left the series early on and attempted to make a movie about his life. In order to prevent this atrocity, the producers eventually gave him his own spin-off. It was just awful. If you want to see just how awful it is, watch Five: US. It's like the only thing they have.
There are a number of errors in the programme that vigilant viewers have spotted over the centuries. Here are just a few:
- Ryan did in fact want to be something other than what he had been trying to be lately.
- The wikipedia article on The OC states that it faced stiff competition in the form of Grey's Anatomy and CSI. This is not true. No-one ever wanted to watch The OC.
- In Season 7, Seth states that "Ryan has eighteen bitches but only two hoes". He meant to say "Ryan has, like, eighteen bitches but only two hoes". Seth himself has no bitches, but he's dating Summer and she can be a bit of a bitch sometimes.
- The vast amount of marrying and re-marrying in One Tree Hill has technically produced three cases of incest.
- When Marissa dies humorously in a car crash and Ryan pulls her from the wreckage, she is clearly trying not to laugh. Hell, we all were.
- In the episode "Summer's Cheerleader Camp Adventure", the writers have clearly re-used scenes from the movie Bring It On. This movie sucked equally.
- In season ten, Marissa tells Ryan she is pregnant. This is impossible, as Marissa is a man.

subset: commoncrawl


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The best way to become an amazing car builder is to absorb the process firsthand at a young age. Ernie Armijo of Norwalk, CA., is a great example of this, as his formidable teenage years were spent in the garage watching his father, Joe Armijo craft his own dream cars. His father's influence was significant in his life as a youngster, and Ernie remembers it fondly. "At that time, my dad was in the process of restoring his '41 Chevy," explains Ernie, who soaked in the tutorials like a sponge. The wide-eyed look on his son's face was certainly not lost on Joe, who was happy to further his son's growing interest by purchasing him a 1953 Bel Air. "I remember being so excited to work on the car, and I couldn't wait until it was done," recalls Ernie. The car was a success, and not just because he liked his build, but because it forever indoctrinated him into the Lowrider lifestyle.
In 1987, Ernie became one of the five original founders of the Stylistics car club. The club hit tough times in '93 but Ernie maintained his dedication, attending any shows he could and representing the Stylistics' name. Things eventually went from bad to worse for the club, and at one point at the start of the 21st century, they found themselves down to just three members. "People started calling us 'the three-car car club,'" says Ernie with a laugh. He can laugh about it now because the club would soon be destined for better days. Once the Stylistics Los Angeles chapter became the mother chapter, the club flourished, growing tremendously within a very short time. Currently, the Stylistics have chapters in Los Angeles, San Diego, Florida, Inland Empire, Arizona, Baltimore and Japan.
Obviously Ernie's Lowrider credentials are solid, and he puts his all into every build, including the 1970 you see before you. Ernie purchased the '70 Impala from his older brother, Joey, who had planned on turning the '70 into a hot rod. "He had the rally rims and the big exhaust," says Ernie. Unfortunately, his brother Joey was forced to sell the car because he became ill. Still, he wanted to keep the car in the family. "That's when my dad and I bought it off him," Ernie proudly states. Feeling the obligation to turn his brother's car into something the whole family could be proud of, Ernie wasted no time in tearing the car apart with his father. The duo kicked off the restoration by pulling the car's engine out and replacing the floors with new metal. Ernie added a chrome intake, valve covers and an alternator to the 350, bringing the motor to life and adding some class under the hood. Paint duties went to Sam at SPS Auto Body out in Long Beach and Danny D of Baldwin Park, respectively. Sam sprayed the Chevy with a beautiful Burgundy color, adding candy and flake techniques, while Danny D. backed it all up with some exquisite line work. The interior was brought to life thanks to the supervision of Joe out at California Upholstery in Bell Gardens, CA., who worked his magic by stitching together different shades of brandy and burgundy, turning this amazing auto into fine wine. A two-pump, six-battery set up provided by Rick of Low Life Hydraulics based out of Inglewood gave the Chevy its bounce, and Ernie himself finished off the build by installing a booming sound system.
The exhausting process took several years to complete, and Ernie is satisfied with the car's overall presence, which is the crucial purpose of any quality build. "It took a lot of work, but I wouldn't do anything different to it," says Ernie with a smile. While he is satisfied, like many builds, Ernie's not quite done with this one just yet. "My future plans for the car are to add more patterns, paint the frame a different color, and chrome the undercarriage," he says with fervor.
Ernie still owns the '53 that his father, Joe, gave him many years ago and they are both still active Stylistics club members. Between them, they hold the keys to multiple cars, including a '41 Chevy, '37 Buick, '53 Bel Air, a truck, and this stunning 1970 Impala Convertible.
Ernie would like to thank his parents, Joe and Susie Armijo, for their support, and he acknowledges the role his father has played in his life and Lowriding career. "My dad helped me build everything I have," says Ernie with great pride. "I also want to thank one of my partners from the club, Green Eyes, for his help." Additionally, he extends his gratitude to the rest of his Stylistics car club members for their constant support and for being like a family to him after all these years.
Tech Specs
"Panty Dropper"
Owner: Ernie Armijo
Vehicle: 1970 Chevy Impala Convertible
City/State: Norwalk, CA
Car Club: Stylistics Los Angeles
Engine: Ernie took matters in his own hands by adding a chrome intake, valve covers, and an alternator to the rebuilt 350 engine.
Body/Paint: Sam at SPS Auto Body in Long Beach, CA., sprayed the '70 with a gorgeous Burgundy color, upgraded with candies and flake. Danny D. of Baldwin Park stepped in to add some fine lines to the convertible as well.
Interior: Joe at California Upholstery in Bell Gardens, CA., stitched together the different shades of Brandy and Burgundy, completing the elegant look of this immaculate Chevy.
Setup: Rick at Low Life Hydraulics in Inglewood, CA., installed the two-pump and six-battery setup in the trunk.
Sound System: Ernie took it upon himself to install the sound system, giving this big body Chevy a sound system to match.
Tires: 155/80R13.
Wheels: 13's chromed with engraved knockoffs.


text:
Producing reliable power from 1600 to 2000 kVA at 50 Hz, our 3516 diesel generator sets are made to meet your mission critical, continuous, standby and prime applications. We've designed each to ISO 8528-5 transient response requirements and to accept 100 per cent rated load in one step. Generator sets offer both low fuel consumption and low emission systems.
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Benign Moles Removal Ascot
Most moles are considered benign, meaning they are harmless. Typically, they are tan, brown, or pink along with distinct border.
Moles are types of lesions or skin growth and is usually referred to as a nevus, a general medical term for a chronic, circumscribed, and visible lesion found on the skin.
Some moles may develop from cells known as melanocytes, which is responsible for making the pigment that gives the skin a natural color. These moles may also develop from other cells like nevus cells. Click here to find out more about us!
What Are the Different Types of Benign Moles
There are three common types of benign moles that people may encounter:
People who want their moles to be removed consult a licensed derma specialist. This is to ensure that the procedure performed is safe and offers the best results.
What Is Cryopen Cryosurgical Treatment Ascot?
With Cryopen Cryosurgical Treatment, benign moles will be removed in a matter of seconds. It uses a linear compression cooling technology, making it the most advanced technology in cryosurgery. In removing benign moles, there is no dangerous cryogenic liquids and gases involved.
The cryopen technology that we offer is known for its numerous benefits. As we apply the ultracold jet of high-pressure nitrous oxide directly to the benign moles, the removal will be effective and fast.
The penetration of cold temperature into the targeted cells is approximately 1mm per 5 seconds of the treatment. This means that if a benign mole has a size of 2mm, it will take 10 seconds for the nitrous oxide to treat. Thus, there is no collateral damage to the surrounding healthy issue due to its accuracy.
The treatment is proven effective and safe, which only takes a few seconds to complete the procedure. After the treatment, some may feel a little residual stinging that will last for a few minutes and occasionally experience a formation of blister for a few hours. However, patients can expect for successful and fast result.
What Causes Benign Moles?
People who have darker complexions are more likely to develop moles after their exposure to the sun. This is due to more melanocytes their complexion have.
Moles can develop anywhere on the body and can be present at birth or develop throughout a person's lifetime. Factors like hormonal changes and exposure to the sunlight can cause the moles to develop or darken.
How to Get Rid of Benign Moles:
Although benign mole does not pose any health risk, people prefer to remove them. They can see a derma specialist to help them safely remove the moles. People can take advantage of our cryopen treatment. Although there might be a blister form after being frozen off, this will quickly heal on its own.
Melanomas may develop on any surface of the skin, which includes the site occupied by the benign moles. So, it is necessary to consult a specialist if the mole undergoes some changes that may indicate signs of becoming cancerous.
A benign mole will not grow back after removal when if proper care is observed in removing the subcutaneous cells during the procedure.
It is possible that benign color may change its color when exposed to the sunlight. However, change in color may indicate a presence of melanoma, so it is recommended to consult a derma consultant.


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Latest Neurology News
WEDNESDAY, July 3 (HealthDay News) -- For people who suffer a spinal cord injury, irreversible tissue loss occurs within 40 days, which is much sooner than previously thought, researchers say.
The investigators used new MRI techniques to assess 13 people with spinal cord injuries. The patients were checked every three months for a year after their injury. After 12 months, the diameter of the spinal cord was 7 percent smaller.
Lesser declines were also evident in the corticospinal tract (which is critical for motor control), and nerve cells in the brain's sensorimotor cortex (which integrates the senses and the motor system), according to the researchers at the University of Zurich in Switzerland and University College London in the United Kingdom.
"Patients with a greater tissue loss above the injury site recovered less effectively than those with less changes," researcher Patrick Freund, of the University of Zurich, said in a university news release.
The study was published July 2 in The Lancet Neurology.
Until now, it had been believed that it took years before tissue changes in the spinal cord and brain above the injury site could be detected. This study shows that tissue loss occurs much earlier and that newer MRI technology can identify these tissue changes and be used to assess the effects of treatment, the researchers noted.
-- Robert Preidt
Copyright © 2013 HealthDay. All rights reserved.


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CBSE Class VI PSA MCQs and Short Questions Database. Based on CBSE and CCE guidelines. The students should practice these Sample Papers to gain perfection which will help him to get more marks in CBSE examination. Based on CBSE and CCE guidelines. Based on the same pattern as released by CBSE every year. CBSE releases sample papers every year. These papers are released prior to the CBSE examinations so that students can do practice.
Please refer to attached file for CBSE Class 6 Science Garbage in Garbage Out MCQs.
Click for more Science Study Material ›


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In ASP.NET, and in particular in the class Page, there are two properties with a similar name -- Culture and UICulture -- that are both necessary when you want to support multiple languages in a page. Both properties are of type String, but can only be assigned some predefined culture names and not just any strings. Culture identifiers are made by two tokens -- the culture name and language name. For example, the string "en-US" indicates the English culture and the U.S. language, whereas "en-GB" stands for English culture and the Great Britain language.
What's the purpose of having two string properties to get and set the requested language and culture for an ASP.NET page? Quite simply, the two properties refer to distinct capabilities and impact on different areas of the user interface.
- The Culture property affects the results of functions such as date, number, and currency formatting.
- The UICulture property determines the localized resource file from which page resources are loaded.
The two culture properties may or may not have the same value. This possibility results in a higher level of flexibility for your code. For example, you can switch the language of text and messages according to the browser's configuration while leaving globalization settings (such as dates and currency) constant.
You set culture properties using attributes of the @Page directive:
<%@ Page UICulture="it-IT" Culture="en-US" %>
Culture settings are page-specific; however, to automatically apply the same settings to all pages in the application you can use the <globalization> section of the web.config file:
<globalization uiculture="it" culture="it-IT" / >
It is important to note that the @Page directive and globalization section are the primary ways to set culture information programmatically. The Culture and UICulture properties exposed by the Page class, although public and read/write, are not intended for use in application code. This means that you are encouraged to use them in internal page code, but not directly from the code-behind. If you need to "multi-language" Web sites, you can derive your pages from a custom base class and add some custom logic to it where you manipulate culture properties. You should not do so, though, if all that you need is setting a fixed culture.
When you set culture properties in @Page or web.config you can also employ a very special value -- auto -- which will perform automatic detection of the browser's preferred language and set properties accordingly. You change the browser's language preference by selecting the Options menu and then the Language tab. After that, you refresh the page, or restart the browser, and the new settings are in place.
It is also essential to note that simply setting Culture and UICulture properties on the Page class is not enough to actually make the language switch. To programmatically change culture settings you need to do the following:
- Override the InitializeCulture method on the code-behind class, or from any custom class that inherits from Page.
- In the method, you set both the page's culture properties and the culture information on the current thread.
The InitializeCulture method is protected and overridable; in the method you set page and thread properties.
protected override void InitializeCulture() { string lang = GetLanguageFromSomeSource(); this.UICulture = lang; this.Culture = lang; Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture = CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture(lang); Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUICulture = CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture(lang); base.InitializeCulture(); }
The thread's CurrentCulture property requires a CultureInfo. It is key to note that the InitializeCulture method is invoked pretty soon in the page lifecycle. When it gets called, you have no access built yet to page controls. If the language is being passed on the query string or a form field, you can only access those values through Request collections. If you go through InitializeCulture, by design, you are guaranteed that any user interface is only rendered after the culture has been set.


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House Majority Leader Cantor discusses state of GOP
When GOP Chief Deputy Whip Peter Roskam, of Wheaton, calls Eric Cantor "leader" at news conferences and delegation meetings, the reverence is clear in his voice.
Democratic Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, of Evanston, displays more disdain, describing the Virginia Republican during a recent Daily Herald interview as "nipping at the heels" of House Speaker John Boehner.
Yet, it is indisputable to those on both sides of the aisle that Cantor, as Republican majority leader, is a powerful figure.
Widely considered to be next in line for the House's top post, Cantor's success depends largely on his relationship with the 435 members of Congress, 19 of them from Illinois.
During a brief stop in Chicago last week, he sat down with the Daily Herald and talked about how the Illinois delegation -- from Roskam to Tea Partyer Joe Walsh -- fits into the party's overall picture and agenda.
Q. We have a new congressional map in Illinois that pits sitting Republican members against others. Will "red on red" warfare, as Republican Sen. Mark Kirk of Highland Park puts it, affect your agenda these next few months?
A. I think Illinois was struck by a redistricting plan that wasn't, in the eyes of some of us, very fair. I think elsewhere in the country we don't have many states that are this extreme.
Q. But you don't see a GOP primary in the 16th District, for instance, between Republican congressmen Don Manzullo and Adam Kinzinger, as something that will complicate things for House leadership?
A. No.
Q. You served as chief deputy and whip, a position Roskam now holds. Watching him from your position at the leadership table, what growth have you seen over the past year?
A. Peter Roskam is a rock star. People like him, he's smart, he's savvy, he understands the policy end and how it relates to the political end. And he's a guy who's very trustworthy. People in Illinois represented by Peter have a good thing going.
Q. How is Roskam doing the job differently than you did?
A. It's hard to be objective, but I know he is very focused on getting to know members, understanding their issues and trying to be a problem solver. That position (as chief deputy whip) is tailor-made for an individual who has really put themselves out there trying to understand people.
Q. What's the biggest challenge you see for him right now?
A. Dealing with a freshman class that's 89 members strong. That's a significant number of new people to Washington. Taking stock of where those individuals are in relation to our constituents. That's a big task and doing that while never forgetting what you come from, never forgetting the people in Illinois.
Q. What about freshmen like Joe Walsh who have not necessarily reached across the aisle?
A. Joe is someone many would say was elected with help of the Tea Party. Most of us look at the Tea Party as something that is extremely positive when you remember what the acronym means -- taxed enough already.
And those representatives are really very focused on getting our fiscal house in order. ... Joe is one who's been very consistent with that theme.
Q. What do you think will be the lasting legacy of the 112th Congress? A House that is known for trying to get something done or holding on to rigid ideology?
A. We are trying to get the right thing done. (The House Republicans' mission is) about results that reflect what I think most Americans want to see -- a Washington that actually works for the people again.
Q. How do you work for bipartisanship, especially in an election year like this one?
A. I really do think there's a window of opportunity right now to say let's set aside the differences. We know there's a divide. But we can agree that we want to grow the economy. And we can agree, though there's not been demonstration right thus far, that if we want to grow jobs, (we) grow them where they come from.


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Medical Services Plan premiums are a tax — let's accept that fact and roll them into the income-tax system. The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives released a report this week presenting 16 possible tax reforms, one of which would see MSP premiums eliminated and income taxes raised to compensate.
While we don't champion the cause of raising taxes irresponsibly, this suggestion makes sense. MSP premiums cover only 12 per cent of B.C.'s health care budget, so we're already paying most of it through income taxes.
The B.C. government is intent on preserving the province's reputation for low taxes, but refusing to raise income taxes while raising MSP premiums is a shell game. Money collected to fund a public service is a tax, no matter what you call it.
Simply collecting the money as income tax would save money — about 4.6 million people are enrolled in MSP, half in group accounts. The government sends monthly bills to 2.3 million residents. About 800,000 low-income British Columbians are exempt from paying premiums.
Many of those involved in group plans have their premiums paid by their employers, but that's regarded as a taxable benefit, meaning taxes are levied on taxes. Collecting more income tax instead of premiums would spare the cost of a huge bureaucracy. Just mailing out invoices costs millions. Add to that the cost of pursuing those who fall behind in their payments — arrears in MSP premiums amount to $360 million.
The CCPA takes it further. Its MSP-elimination scenario would see a 20-per-cent increase to each of B.C.'s five tax brackets, and adding two new brackets with rates of 20 per cent and 22 per cent for annual incomes of $150,000 and $200,000 respectively. The research institute says that would bring in close to the same amount that premiums yield, but more of the burden would be shifted to higher earners.
With the increase recommended by the CCPA, a person earning $50,000 would pay $574 more each year in income tax, but would be spared the MSP premium of $798, if single, or $1,526, if supporting a family.
Under the current system, the premiums are the same for all income levels beyond the threshold of $30,000. Paying the single premium of $798 a year is of little consequence to someone making $100,000 a year, but to someone making $30,000 or $40,000, it's a hardship. The monthly premiums of $120.50 for a family of two and $133 for a family of three or more are significant sums to families counting pennies.
At the higher end, it makes a substantial difference. With the suggested increases, a person making $500,000 a year would pay $27,548 more in income tax, but B.C.'s low-tax reputation would not be significantly tarnished — that person would still pay substantially less in provincial income taxes than he or she did in 2000.
One of the principles of the income-tax system is that those who have more pay a bigger share. The same should apply to health care. The boast that B.C. tax rates are among the lowest in Canada rings a little hollow, given that it is the only province that charges health care premiums. Eliminating the premiums and raising income taxes to compensate is a more honest and transparent approach.


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Jay-Z Announces 'Magna Carta Holy Grail' Album to Arrive in July
While fans of both the Miami Heat and San Antonio Spurs were biting their nails over game five of the NBA Finals, the intensity was interrupted by a surprising announcement made by Jay-Z during halftime.
With the help of Samsung (not an iPhone fan?), the rapper announced that his 12th LP, 'Magna Carta Holy Grail,' will be dropping on July 4.
The black-and-white 3-minute video features clips of Jay in the studio working with Rick Rubin, Swizz Beatz, Pharrell and Timbaland.
"The album is about this duality," he tells Rick in the TV spot. "How do you navigate your way through this whole thing through success, through failures and remain yourself?"
Talking about where he sees hip-hop going, Jay-Z claims that his team will be writing "the new rules" for the genre with this album. From brainstorming sessions, listening to cuts and even putting finishing touches on the art, fans get a chance to see the work surrounding 'Magna Carta Holy Grail.'
And with the hype around the LP soaring in the last 12 hours, reports detail that Jay-Z has already sold his first million copies. According to the Wall Street Journal's Speakeasy blog, Samsung has already pre-ordered a million copies of the album to give out to Samsung Galaxy users for free three days before it releases. All Galaxy users need to do is download the official Magna Carta app on June 24, and they will be able to get it for free, according to the album's official site.


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Flights to Tel Aviv from San Jose
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|Sat 21 Sep 2013, 8:00pm–12:15am
Eventfinda tickets no longer on sale
Katchafire are finally back in Aotearoa New Zealand after successful tours of Europe, UK and USA in 2013. "The Best So Far" tour celebrates the new best of album from the 7 piece Hamilton band and includes songs from all four of their studio albums to date. It has been a busy time for the band in 2013 but they are keen to not only showcase their hits, but to give their fans a taste of brand new material too which will be heard for the first time.
Once again Katchafire bring will be supported by some of this countries best underground acts in what will be another celebration of Aotearoa Roots music for reggae lovers. Don't miss one of the few opportunities to see Katchafire perform their full show on "The Best So Far" tour this winter.
Waihi Beach Hotel Show:
Support bands are Majic and DJ Hemz
8.00pm Doors open and DJ Hemz
9.00pm Majic
10.00pm Katchafire
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Errol, New Hampshire
|This article is a stub. Help us to expand it by contributing your knowledge. For county and town page guidelines, visit U.S. County Page Content Suggestions.
Errol is a town in Coos county, New Hampshire. It was formed in 1774. Its parent county/ies is/are Grafton. For more information, contact the county at P.O. Box 100, Errol 03579. On the attached map, Errol is shown as 15 in Coos.
For information about the state of New Hampshire see New Hampshire Family History Research.


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If you've never seen a Bollywood movie before, think John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John in Grease, then pump up the colour saturation, quadruple the number of dancing extras, switch the soundtrack to an A.R. Rahman masala mix and imagine Indo-Western hybrid outfits that grow more extravagant with every change of camera angle.
Like their classic forerunners of the 1970s and 1980s, modern Bollywood blockbusters demand the biggest screens and heftiest sound systems on the market, and they don't come bigger or heftier than those in the Metro BIG in Mumbai, the grande dame of the city's surviving Art Deco picture houses. A palpable aura of old-school glamour still hangs over the place, at its most glittering on red-carpet nights, when huge crowds gather in the street outside for a glimpse of stars such as Shah Rukh Kahn or Ashwariya Rai posing for the paparazzi in front of the iconic 1930s facade.
A sense of occasion strikes you the moment you step into the Metro BIG's foyer, with its plush crimson drapery and polished Italian marble floors. A 2006 revamp transformed the auditorium into a state-of-the-art multiplex, complete with six screens, lashings of chrome and reclining seats, but the developers had the good sense to leave the heritage features in the rest of the building intact. Belgian crystal chandeliers still hang from the ceilings, reflected in herringbone-patterned mirrors on the mid-landing, with original stucco murals lining the staircases.
While the Metro may have had a makeover, the same quirky conventions that have styled Indian cinema for decades still very much hold sway – in spite of Bollywood's glossier modern image and bigger budgets. So while the waistlines have dropped and cleavages become more pronounced, the star-crossed hero and heroine still have to make do with a coy rub of noses rather than a proper kiss.
Down in the stalls of the Metro BIG, meanwhile, the new decor hasn't subdued behaviour in the cheaper seats. Shouting at the screen, cheering every time the hero wallops someone, and singing along with the love songs are still very much part of the experience – even if overpriced popcorn has supplanted five-rupee wraps of peanuts.
Mumbai's Metro BIG Cinema is at Dhobi Talao Junction, at the top of Azad Maidan, a short cab ride from CST (VT) Station. For details, see www.bigcinemas.com.
Top image: Bollywood dancers © Filip Fuxa/Shutterstock
For hundreds more ultimate travel experiences, get Rough Guides' Make The Most Of Your Time On Earth


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Orlando — Football wasn't far from the minds of the attendees and keynote speakers at the Athletic Business Conference and Expo held Nov. 29-Dec. 1 at the Orange County Convention Center.
Keynote speaker Joe Theismann, former quarterback of the NFL's Washington Redskins and a former analyst for ESPN, spoke in place of originally scheduled keynote speaker Rick Reilly, whose last day as a writer for Sports Illustrated before moving to ESPN conflicted with the conference. In his "Game Plan for Success" address,Theismann recounted stories of his playing days with the Redskins, and in particular a game on Nov. 18, 1985, when his career ended after he broke his leg on "Monday Night Football."
"I understand change," Theismann told the audience. "I've never had a failure in my life, only educational experiences."
Theismann went on to encourage the audience to write down their goals and not be afraid to try something different in their lives.
Tom Morris, a philosopher and author, also discussed the importance of writing down goals in his keynote address. Morris, a former philosophy professor at the University of Notre Dame, told a story about how former Notre Dame football coach Lou Holtz once wrote down 107 goals after he was fired from an assistant coaching position. Of those 107 goals, 97 became true.
Morris outlined what he says are the seven Cs of success: conception, confidence, concentration, consistency, commitment, character and a capacity to enjoy. To stress the commitment aspect of success, Morris told a story about how 26 of the 29 freshmen on the Notre Dame football team who took his class flunked his first exam. After Morris spent extra time with the students on Thursday nights, they all passed the class with flying colors.
The welcome reception at Hard Rock Live at Universal Studios CityWalk featured the cover band 2 A.M.
In all, there were more than 3,400 attendees and 356 companies in 705 booths at the show. One of those companies was ProSpot Fitness, which is owned by former Atlanta Falcons football players Travis Hall and Jamal Anderson.
Several fitness facilities were honored at the 27thannual Athletic Business Facilities of Merit awards reception. The recipients were: Boll Family YMCA, Detroit; Firstenburg Community Center, Vancouver, WA; Kenyon Athletic Center, Kenyon College, Gambier, OH; Killarney Community Pool, Vancouver, B.C.; Legends Community Centre, Oshawa, Ont.; The Ohio State University Recreation and Physical Activity Center, Columbus, OH; Koeppel Community Sports Center, Trinity College, Hartford, CT; University of California, Santa Barbara Recreation Center Expansion, Santa Barbara, CA; and the John Paul Jones Arena, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA.
"We're certainly very proud of that honor," says Dave Miletich, the Vancouver, WA, parks and recreation assistant director.
The show was held in conjunction with the International Council on Active Aging Conference, among others.
The next Athletic Business Conference and Expo will be held Dec. 4-6, 2008, in San Antonio.


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It has been nearly 15 months since Kirk Urso suddenly and tragically passed away at the age of 22 from an undetected congenital heart defect, but Tuesday night's Columbus Crew awards ceremony was a testament to the influence he still exerts on the club and the world at large.
At the event held at the Via Vecchia Winery in the Brewery District, Crew President and General Manager Mark McCullers announced that the Kirk Urso Memorial Fund has already reached its 2013 funding goal of $100,000. The amount set a Crew Soccer Foundation record for any single initiative and any one calendar year.
"It's a very meaningful milestone," McCullers said. "Later this year, we will be awarding our inaugural (research) grant in conjunction with the Children's Heart Foundation. We will continue to raise funds for youth heart health and congenital heart defects, and we will continue to honor the memory of our teammate Kirk Urso through the Kirk Urso Memorial Fund."
Kyle Urso, Kirk's brother, tweeted: "Thank you to everyone who has donated to the Urso Fund. The outcome is absolutely incredible."
Urso's memory has also continued to make an impact within the team. The players voted Eric Gehrig as the winner of the Kirk Urso Heart Award, given annually to the player that best represents Urso's leadership, hard work, good humor and dedication to the team. In 2012, the players voted Urso as the posthumous winner of the inaugural award, so Gehrig became the first player to follow in Urso's footsteps.
"It feels great," Gehrig said while accepting the award. "Kirk was one of our best friends on the team. He came to work with a smile on his face no matter what was going on. Obviously. I'm honored to be in that same category. I love my teammates. I think that I may forget the wins and losses, but I will always remember my teammates. The fact that they think that highly of me as a person, it means a lot. It really does."
His teammates offered their congratulations on an award well-deserved.
"Eric is the perfect winner for it," said Ben Speas, who was Urso's teammate both professionally and collegiately. "The thing I think of is that when I was at North Carolina with Kirk, he was always business when it came to practice. Guys will screw around or not take something seriously, and Kirk was the one to snap people out of that and make sure that we're getting work done. Then off the field, he was the first to have fun. I think that Eric is the exact same way. He comes to practice every single day and works his butt off, no matter what's going to happen. Whether he's going to play the whole game or not play at all, he practices the same way. That's a similarity he has with Kirk that really sticks out to me."
Ethan Finlay cited Gehrig's ability to be an upbeat sounding board for veterans and rookies, first-teamers and reserve-teamers, as a trait that made him a worthy winner.
"Eric is going to give you some positive encouragement or just talk to you," Finlay said. "He's a guy you can just talk to. Kirk was a great listener. Not many people in this world are great listeners, but Kirk was, and so is Eric. They put the thoughts and needs of others before their own. That's really special."
"Eric's one of those guys that always seems to light up a room," added Danny O'Rourke. "Kirk and Eric each seemed to find their own niche, with their own personality within the team."
Finlay said he noticed the beloved "Kirk smirk" cross Gehrig's face when he was on stage accepting the award.
"That was great," Finlay said. "He was genuinely honored. It was beautiful. I'm proud of him, and I'm proud of my teammates for recognizing him as the winner. He's a good guy and a deserving winner."
Sandy Urso, Kirk's mother, said that the Urso family was delighted to learn that Gehrig won the award that symbolizes her son's legacy as a leader and a teammate.
"All of us—and we know Kirk, also—are so happy that Eric was presented the award," she said. "His positivity so mirrors Kirk's. Kirk knew Eric prior to coming to the Crew and always admired him. We are elated."
Urso's memory loomed large even after the Urso Fund announcement and the awarding of his eponymous honor. It was later revealed that Ben Speas' March 23 strike at D.C. United was voted the Crew's Goal of the Year. It was a goal Speas famously dedicated to Urso.
"The award means a lot to me," Speas said. "The goal was for Kirk. [Federico] Higuain had plenty of brilliant goals, so I'm not even going to talk about the soccer part of it, but the goal was really special to me and I am glad that the fans voted for it."


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|Aug 26, 2013
A skeleton for chromosomes
|(Nanowerk News) Every single cell in the human body contains an entire copy of the genetic blueprint, the DNA. Its total length is about 3.5 meters and all of it has to fit into the cells nucleus, just one-hundredth of a millimeter in diameter. Blown up in proportion, this would equal the task of squeezing a 150km long string into a soccer ball. Just how the cell manages to wrap up its DNA so tightly is still poorly understood.
|One way of compacting DNA is achieved by coiling it tightly around histone-proteins. This mechanism has been studied in detail and is the focus of an entire discipline, Epigenetics. However, simple organisms such as bacteria have to manage their DNA-packaging without histones, and even in human cells histones probably cannot do the job on their own.
|A new role for an old molecule
|A team of scientists at the Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP) in Vienna can now present evidence for an additional mechanism involved in structuring DNA. Managing Director Jan-Michael Peters and his research group discovered that a protein-complex named cohesin has a stabilizing effect on DNA. In evolutionary terms, cohesin is very old and its structure has hardly changed over billions of years. It was present long before histones and might therefore provide an ancient mechanism in shaping DNA.
|Cell biologists are already familiar with cohesin and its role in cell division. The protein-complex is essential for the correct distribution of chromosomes to daughter cells. It forms a molecular ring that keeps sister-chromatids together until the precise moment when segregation takes place. This function and the molecular structure of cohesin have been discovered by IMP-scientists in 1997.
|Antonio Tedeschi, a postdoc in the group of Jan-Michael Peters, has now found evidence that cohesin supports the architecture of DNA in non-dividing (interphase) cells. He analyzed cells in which he had shut down the function of Wapl. This protein controls how tightly cohesin binds to DNA. Without Wapl, cohesin is locked onto chromatin in an unusually stable state. As a consequence, cells are unable to express their genes correctly and cannot divide ("Wapl is an essential regulator of chromatin structure and chromosome segregation").
|Artistic interpretation of fluorescent light micrographs of Wapl depleted nuclei which show cohesin vermicelli. The nuclei have been pseudo-colored and scaled to different sizes.
|Vermicelli keep DNA in shape
|When he analyzed Wapl-depleted cells under the microscope, Tedeschi found elongated structures that he called vermicelli (Italian for small worms). Since one vermicello is present for each chromosome, he concluded that its function is to keep chromosomes in shape, rather like a skeleton.
|We think that the vermicelli are the bones of interphase chromosomes, says Jan-Michael Peters. Just like our bodies depend on the bones for support, the cells depend very much on cohesin to retain their structure.
|The importance of the cohesin-system becomes obvious in cases where it is impaired. Several rare congenital diseases have been linked to mutations in the respective gene. The faulty structure of the cohesin molecule causes severe developmental retardation and is a serious medical condition. There are no causal therapies available at present.
|Source: IMP - Forschungsinstitut für Molekulare Pathologie
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I really cannot explain what a car ride is like with the Jobe Crew. Loud, yes, but more than that. So much more.
Last night was Parent's Night Out at Sharonville UMC. This is where Kevin and I have our church membership. In the United Methodist system, pastors hold membership at a church where they are not pastoring. Anyway, shortly after 9 PM, we were all headed back home. The kids were wired!
They had seen parts of Wall-E. They started out talking about that and every few minutes, the entire way home, Ella would pipe up with, "Wall-E waked up!"
The moon was out, so Risi, every few minutes, would howl at it. Risi has this thing about dogs.
Josiah, Olivia, and Grace alternated between singing, fighting and yelling from the back of the car up to where Kevin and I sat up in the front.
I was driving and giggling most of the way home. It was crazy. And just when it got a little less chaotic, Risi would howl, or Ella would tell us "Wall-E waked up!" And when they didn't do it, I would, and we would laugh harder.
At one point Grace was singing "Hark the Herald Angels Sing." (The conversation had switched to a Charlie Brown Christmas . )
But Grace had the words a bit mixed up....
"...glory to the newborn King.
Peace on earth
In mercy mired..."
I was looking at definitions of "mired". To sink into. To be held fast by.
And mercy? Compassionate or kindly forbearance shown toward an offender.
An offender, that is you and me. "For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." Rom. 3:23
A misunderstood song, sung gustily by a young girl. Mired in mercy. I am covered by, sunk into and held fast by mercy. I can certainly think of worse things to be covered with.
Peace on Earth, In Mercy Mired.
Thank you, Jesus.
Saturday, December 6, 2008
Peace on Earth In Mercy Mired.........
I really cannot explain what a car ride is like with the Jobe Crew. Loud, yes, but more than that. So much more.
Posted by Mom to 5...Daughter of the King at 9:42 AM
Labels: Advent, date night, family life, Funny
5 comments:
- Anita said...
I LOVE it....that might be the best new Christmas song this year! :)
- December 6, 2008 at 12:10 PM
- Melissa said...
Our car rides are too quiet now with each kid having a headset and the DVD player going. However, getting in and out of the van is always a fight. "MOM! Anna got in first, that means go to the backseat." "MOM! Cameron hit me when I trying sit down!" "MOM!!!!!!" I'm changing my name to DAD!
- December 6, 2008 at 6:44 PM
- Mommakitten said...
How precious. Her name suites her.
- December 7, 2008 at 11:20 AM
- a Tonggu Momma said...
Beautiful. Just beautiful.
- December 7, 2008 at 7:38 PM
- Hilty Sprouts said...
Boy am I glad I'm mired in mercy!
Thanks for another good laugh!
- December 8, 2008 at 11:35 AM


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"I'm very involved in the machinery and the technical ways of making music these days, and it is exciting for young people, writing music on their computers with loops and drum machines and making gorgeous, exciting sounding records. But what I miss is well-written songs with great ideas, wonderful lyrics, beautiful rhymes and wonderful melodies. I don't hear that anymore, I feel very angry about that," Manilow told FOX411's Pop Tarts column.
"People are making great records because of all the technical abilities, but what I try to do is turn all that stuff off. Do you have a song when you're done? I tell these young people to turn off the drums and all that stuff, and ask themselves is there a melody and lyrics there? Can you just sing it there with a guitar or are you locked into all these machines? I don't think they do. If there is one thing I miss in music these days it is great song writing. I think we've lost it."
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/20 ... z2NDQTTMFW
Barry Manilow: Today's Music Is Made By Machines
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President Obama said Friday that even though the $85 billion in federal spending cuts are "going to hurt," the country will get through it. NBC's Chuck Todd reports.
Lamenting the idea that only a "Jedi mind meld" could prod the GOP into compromise, President Barack Obama said Friday that the "dumb" automatic across-the-board cuts taking effect Friday are the fault of Republican resistance to a reasonable deal to avert the sequestration's budget reductions.
"I know that this has been some of the conventional wisdom that's been floating around Washington," Obama told reporters after meeting with congressional leaders. "Even though most people agree that I'm being reasonable, that most people agree that I am presenting a fair deal -- the fact that [Republicans] don't take it means that I should somehow do a Jedi mind meld with these folks and convince them to do what's right," he said.
Obama spoke hours before signing an order officially enacting the cuts, which take effect at midnight Friday.
Asked why leaders did not negotiate more vigorously to get a deal before sequestration deadline day, Obama said that his ability to negotiate is limited by Congress's unwillingness.
"I'm not a dictator," he said. "I'm the president. So ultimately if Mitch McConnell or John Boehner say 'I need to go to catch a plane,' I can't have Secret Service block the doorway, right?"
Obama acknowledged that the sequester's effects will be painful but predicted that the cuts will be manageable by a resilient American people.
"We will get through this," he said. "This is not going to be an apocalypse, I think, as some people have said. It's just dumb. And it's going to hurt."
President Barack Obama discusses his Friday sequester meeting at the White House with Capitol Hill lawmakers, including House Speaker John Boehner.
The president huddled Friday with leaders at the White House in a meeting largely considered to be a show of effort in advance of inevitable sequestration cuts.
The session lasted less than an hour.
Recommended: Sequester Day caps off an absurd week
In a brief statement to reporters after the meeting, Boehner reiterated that Republicans will continue to oppose Democratic proposals to raise new revenues to offset the cuts.
"The discussion about revenue, in my opinion, is over," he said. "It's about taking on the spending problem here in Washington."
The House speaker added that Congress will move next week on a measure to maintain government funding after March 27th.
Obama and Vice President Joe Biden met with Boehner, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.
But even since the meeting was first announced on Wednesday, hopes were bleak for an eleventh hour solution to the across-the-board cuts.
In a written statement released Friday morning before the meeting, McConnell all but promised that no last-minute solution would be hammered out.
"I'm happy to discuss other ideas to keep our commitment to reducing Washington spending at today's meeting," he said. "But there will be no last-minute, back-room deal and absolutely no agreement to increase taxes."
Budget sequestration, which formally begins when the president orders it into effect sometime before 11:59 p.m. ET tonight, will result in $85 billion in spending cuts this fiscal year.
Related: Boehner: 'Polite' meeting but 'there's no plan' to replace sequester
This story was originally published on Fri Mar 1, 2013 11:13 AM EST


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If you haven't heard about it, bloggers have been totally trashed by Forbes magazine in Attack of the Blogs, and some horrid advice has been offered to businesses about blogging. So sad that a once leading magazine should take such a low road.
Anyway, here are some articles to bring you up to speed.
- Bayosphere – Forbes Versus Blogs Surprisingly Trashy Journalism
- Attack of the Blogs Discussion with Paul Kedrosky
- BoingBoing – How to punish bloggers, a tutorial for businesses from Forbes
- Forbes Cover Story Blows It, Calling Bloggers Lynch Mobs
- Forbes says bloggers are the new evil-doers
- Inside Google – Blog Attack
- Blog Herald – Forbes Does Cover Story Hatchet Job on Blogging
- Weblogs Work – Attack of the 50 Foot Blog
- Forbes Blasts Bloggers; Bloggers Blast Back
- Forbes's Trashy Blog Attack
- Shallow journalism at Forbes magazine
Technorati Tags: blogs, attack, forbes
Site Search Tags: blogs, attack, forbes


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Robert Bryant
- Phillip Griffiths Professor of Mathematics
- Professor in the Department of Mathematics
Tuesdays and Thursdays, 10:30-12:00PM, and by appointment
Research Areas and Keywords
Algebra & Combinatorics
integrability, symplectic geometry
differential geometry, exterior differential systems, complex geometry
Computational Mathematics
Geometry: Differential & Algebraic
differential geometry, holonomy, exterior differential systems, integrability, curvature, Lie groups, symplectic geometry, complex geometry, homology
Mathematical Physics
holonomy, exterior differential systems, symplectic geometry
PDE & Dynamical Systems
differential geometry, holonomy, exterior differential systems, integrability, symplectic geometry
curvature, Lie groups, homology
My research concerns problems in the geometric theory of partial differential equations. More specifically, I work on conservation laws for PDE, Finsler geometry, projective geometry, and Riemannian geometry, including calibrations and the theory of holonomy.
Much of my work involves or develops techniques for studying systems of partial differential equations that arise in geometric problems. Because of their built-in invariance properties, these systems often have special features that make them difficult to treat by the standard tools of analysis, and so my approach uses ideas and techniques from the theory of exterior differential systems, a collection of tools for analyzing such PDE systems that treats them in a coordinate-free way, focusing instead on their properties that are invariant under diffeomorphism or other transformations.
I'm particularly interested in geometric structures constrained by natural conditions, such as Riemannian manifolds whose curvature tensor satisfies some identity or that supports some additional geometric structure, such as a parallel differential form or other geometric structures that satisfy some partial integrability conditions and in constructing examples of such geometric structures, such as Finsler metrics with constant flag curvature.
I am also the Director of the Simons Collaboration Special Holonomy in Geometry, Analysis, and Physics, and a considerable focus of my research and that of my students is directed towards problems in this area.


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Goddammit. Another truckload of bees.
For what it's worth, it was never different. Not in the last 50 years, anyway.
I should delight in people being fooled; in believing nonsense, in being confused. But I don't.
It used to be different. It used to be that people were victims of government propaganda. Today, we're the victims of our own. Anyone with a cause can make up some bullshit infographic that deceptively appeals to the emotions of a whole swath of idiots and the fucking thing will spread like wildfire on every social media platform in existence.
What place does a Discordian have in this Brave New World?
Quote from: Pope Pelvis Flirtini on September 09, 2017, 03:01:56 amI should delight in people being fooled; in believing nonsense, in being confused. But I don't. I think that's more of a SubGenius thing - they don't necessarily care if the pinks get screwed, it's amusing to them to see a fool and his money go their separate waysIn My Discordia, the cabbages and grayfaces and shitheads are the victims of bureaucracy--and if we've actually found a personal route to salvation, we owe it to our neighbors to speak up about itI'm not into making coleslawI want everybody in my world to be in on the joke
Don't fucking judge me, I've got tentacles for a face.
To me, Discordia is about learning to accept and navigate chaotic situations, to create order where we want when we want rather than everywhere all the time, and to infect others with the idea as best as we can. It's not Ken M. Disco or Gum In The Turnstiles Discordia, but it's mine and I like it.Accepting that you're bad at a given uniform you've picked up is a really good step towards recognizing the fact that you are more than your uniforms, and you get to choose what to wear and even learn to sew your own. This is all The Work, too.


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The US Supreme Court delved into the issue of gay marriage Tuesday, examining whether or not California's Proposition 8 is unconstitutional. On Wednesday, SCOTUS will take up the Defense of Marriage Act. NBC's Pete Williams reports.
In a historic oral argument on a challenge to state laws that limit marriage to heterosexual couples, the Supreme Court indicated Tuesday that it might not strike down such laws.
The justice whom many observers view as the swing vote in the case, Justice Anthony Kennedy, voiced worry at one point during the argument that proponents of same-sex marriages were asking the court to issue a decision that would "go into uncharted waters."
After the oral argument, Pete Williams of NBC News reported that it seemed "quite obvious that the U.S. Supreme Court is not prepared to issue any kind of sweeping ruling" declaring that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry.
Williams said there seemed to be "very little eagerness" from any of the justices to "embrace that broad a ruling."
LISTEN: Audio of the oral arguments
At issue Tuesday was California's Proposition 8, the state constitutional amendment enacted by voters in 2008 that limits marriage to one man-one woman couples. Those seeking to have the court strike down Proposition 8 argue that the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment includes a right for same-sex couples to marry.
Williams said that both the liberal and the conservative justices seemed wary of issuing a decision that would apply to any state outside of California.
Art Lien
A courtroom sketch of the oral arguments.
It seemed possible the court would not issue any ruling on marriage at all – deciding instead that it had made a mistake in even agreeing to hear the case since the plaintiffs, supporters of Proposition 8, might lack the legal standing to bring the suit.
"I just wonder if the case was properly granted," Kennedy said at one point to attorney Theodore Olson who was representing those challenging the California law.
And a few justices seemed to imply that it might be prudent for the court to step back and allow the states to assess what the effects of same-sex marriages might be.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor said at one point, "If the issue is letting the states experiment and letting the society have more time to figure out its direction, why is taking a case now the answer?"
Along similar lines, Justice Samuel Alito said "there isn't a lot of data" about the social effects of the institution of same-sex marriage.
"And it may turn out to be a good thing; it may turn out not to be a good thing, as the supporters of Proposition 8 apparently believe," Alito said to Solicitor General Donald Verrilli, who was arguing for the Obama administration, as a friend of the court, in opposition to Proposition 8.
"But you want us to step in and render a decision based on an assessment of the effects of this institution which is newer than cell phones or the Internet?"
NBC's Pete Williams reports on the latest from the Supreme Court hearing. The New Republic's Jeffrey Rosen joins the conversation to talk about the potential outcome of the case.
Alito added, "On a question like that, of such fundamental importance, why should it not be left for the people, either acting through initiatives and referendums or through their elected public officials?"
Kennedy, while expressing those same concerns, also noted, "On the other hand, there is an immediate legal injury or legal – what could be a legal injury, and that's the voice of these children. There are some 40,000 children in California ... that live with same-sex parents, and they want their parents to have full recognition and full status."
It is possible that a majority of the justices could support a ruling that applies only to California – or one that applies only to California and several other states which allow domestic partnerships that are almost identical to marriage in all but name.
During the argument, Justice Antonin Scalia was the one justice who voiced the most skepticism about the argument that limiting marriage to heterosexual couples is a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause.
He said to Olson, "I'm curious, when did it become unconstitutional to exclude homosexual couples from marriage? 1791? 1868, when the Fourteenth Amendment was adopted? Was it always unconstitutional?"
Olson replied that "when we as a culture determined that sexual orientation is a characteristic of individuals that they cannot control" then at that point limiting marriage became unconstitutional.
Scalia then asked, "When did that happen?"
Olson responded, "There's no specific date in time. This is an evolutionary cycle."
At another point Chief Justice John Roberts asked Olson whether those seeking to strike down Proposition 8 were interested only in the label "marriage," since the state of California already grants same-sex couples almost all the legal protections and rights provided to heterosexual married couples.
"So it's just about the label in this case," Roberts said.
"The label "marriage" means something," Olson answered.
NBC's Pete Williams reports from outside the Supreme Court on the impending decision on Proposition 8, saying that it doesn't seem likely that there will be a "sweeping ruling" on gay rights from the justices.
But Roberts then observed, "If you tell a child that somebody has to be their friend, I suppose you can force the child to say, 'this is my friend,' but it changes the definition of what it means to be a friend."
Court observers caution that one should not read too much into the questions the justices ask and the comments they make during oral argument since they don't necessarily reflect how any particular justice would ultimately vote in the case.
Charles Cooper, who served in the Reagan administration as assistant attorney general in charge of the Office of Legal Counsel, argued the case Tuesday for supporters of Proposition 8.
Although the justices are deciding a constitutional question, the argument is taking place as polls indicate that public opinion is shifting toward acceptance of same-sex marriage.
In recent years, nine states, either through court rulings, legislation, or ballot measures, have redefined marriage to include same-sex couples. But most states have laws or constitutional provisions that define marriage as the union of one man and one woman.
More elected officials, such as Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Sen. Jon Tester, D- Mont., are personally endorsing same-sex marriage, but it remains to be seen whether the justices will be influenced by public opinion.
In a statement Tuesday, Tester said, "no one should be able to tell a Montanan or any American who they can love and who they can marry."
Three weeks ago Tester signed an amicus brief filed by Democratic members of Congress urging the justices to overturn part of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act.
On Wednesday the high court will hear oral arguments in that challenge to one section of the Defense of Marriage Act, which for purposes of federal regulations and benefits, defines marriage as "a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife."
This story was originally published on Tue Mar 26, 2013 4:01 AM EDT


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Iraqi Christian Leaders View U.S. Troop Departure With Uncertainty and Hope
In the wake of the American-led invasion, the Christian population has been cut in half.
Amid President Obama's announcement that the United States will bring home the remainder of its troops from Iraq by the end of this year, Church leaders in Iraq said the situation for the country's Christians remains unchanged. Yet they expressed hope for their future.
"Even with the American presence here, we have had problems — explosions, kidnappings, murders, attacks on Christian churches," said Chaldean Catholic Archbishop Louis Sako of Kirkuk, a flashpoint in the conflict.
Since the American-led invasion in 2003, Archbishop Sako said, violence has claimed the lives of 905 Iraqi Christians, including one bishop, five priests and a number of sub-deacons. Despite the U.S. presence in the country, 54 churches have been bombed, mainly Chaldean. Prior to the invasion, Christians in Iraq numbered 800,000 to 1 million. Now just 400,000 to a half million remain.
"The situation is still fragile and not stable. We don't know what will be next with the pullout," Archbishop Sako said.
"We are worried about the security, about our borders and the unity of our country. Who will watch them and protect them? Who will guarantee the unity of our land with the new sectarian mentality? The Iraqi army and police are not well trained. They don't have the appropriate weapons."
Archbishop Sako said there still has not been any reconciliation between the country's various ethnic, political and religious groups, nor with the members of the old regime. "Not all of them were criminals," he said.
'We Have Learned Much'
The Iraqi government is still not completely formed, the archbishop reported.
"We have fears, but we also have hopes that the Iraqis will take seriously their responsibilities, make a real reconciliation. They have to forget the past and to prepare a better future. They should forgive each other for the benefit of the country and not [seek to] take revenge," he added.
"Emigration is continuing, and, also, there is no real vision for the future. We Christians can be attacked at any time.
"The only way to live together in harmony and peace — not just for Iraq, but for all the countries in the region — is to have a good army, security and a constitution, based on human rights and not based only on the consideration of the religion and ethnicity of the individual. The priority should be that all Iraqis are citizens. The government should not make the distinction of individuals based on their religion and ethnicity and give them privileges for that. The Muslim majority and other religious minorities should have the same dignity, rights and also responsibilities," the archbishop stated.
Bashar Warda, the 42-year-old Chaldean Catholic archbishop of Erbil, is counting on all religious and ethnic groups represented in the country to work together to forge a future.
"I am trusting that the Iraqis will work together, whether the American troops are here or not," said Bishop Warda, who was installed last year.
"The pullout is a big challenge for all Iraqis to examine themselves, that they are willing and able to make a good future for all Iraq," Bishop Warda said.
"I am an optimist that things will work for the good, not because of the pullout, but because of the awareness of the Iraqis about so many issues concerning our living as Iraqis and the development of our life. I think we have learned so much — about dialogue, politics, health care, development of our country."
Sad Anniversary
Mosul's Chaldean Catholic Bishop Amel Nona took a darker view of the evolving situation: "There are many Christians leaving, because they don't see hope for their future."
During this extended period of crisis, Bishop Nona has urged Iraqi Christians "to go deeper into our faith. If we live our faith like true Christians — like Christ — we can better support our hardships," said the 44-year-old bishop, who was also installed last year.
Shlemon Warduni, curial bishop of the Chaldean Catholic patriarchate in Baghdad, said: "We have been harmed too much: our Church, our Christians. More than half of our people [Christians] have gone. … This situation caused too many people to emigrate from Iraq, especially Christians, because there is no work for them because there is no peace and security. This is the problem."
"I am not a politician, but the least I can say is that I just want peace and security for my country," said Bishop Warduni, who was recently appointed president of Caritas Iraq.
"So, whether the American troops stay or go, we want peace, just as everyone wants peace for their country. … We need peace and security and justice for our people."
In Baghdad, Yousif Mansoor Abba, installed in April as Syriac Catholic bishop for the diocese, is preparing for the Nov. 1 memorial Mass at Our Lady of Salvation Cathedral, which came under siege during Sunday evening Mass on Oct. 31 last year.
By the time the military raided the Baghdad cathedral to free the hostages, 45 faithful, including two priests, had been killed and more than 100 were wounded. Pope Benedict XVI condemned the "savage" attack on the cathedral, saying, "I pray for the victims of this absurd violence, even more ferocious in that it has been inflicted upon defenseless people gathered in God's house, which is a house of love and reconciliation."
Syriac Catholic Patriarch Ignatius Joseph III Younan will travel from Lebanon to celebrate the memorial Mass. In praying with his flock there, the patriarch said he hopes "to inspire in them hope and courage to stand up against terrorism and violence." Maronite Catholic Patriarch Bechara Rai is also scheduled to participate.
"We will pray for the martyrs and ask God to give us peace," said Bishop Abba of the upcoming memorial Mass at the cathedral, which is still under renovation. "We ask for prayers for peace."
Register correspondent Doreen Abi Raad writes from Beirut, Lebanon.


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Views: 509
Congrats and great learning curve. :)
I'd only like to disagree with the last paragraph. Jails too are meeting places, ... charity and churches... I don't believe in their altruism. Their charity is never what it seems... it's marketing (making their pitch) and permanent membership driving. They disguise their intentions, camouflage them as 'charity', and it's at the very core of their dishonesty.


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RE: Tnsnames mystery
Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2012 10:13:08 -0500
Message-ID: <3DC440E2338A24439D527C2E64E1ECBC42C727_at_deeds.pti-nps.com>
If I recall correctly, TNS_ADMIN can also be set in the registry (HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\ORACLE\KEY_homename), which probably did not get cleaned out with the uninstall. I would expect that your search for TNSNAMES.ora would have turned up another file, unless there's a hidden version of the file somewhere.
-----Original Message-----
From: oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org [mailto:oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org] On Behalf Of Storey, Robert (DCSO) Sent: Tuesday, August 21, 2012 10:04 AM
To: 'paul.baumgartel_at_ubs.com'; oracle-l_at_freelists.org Subject: RE: Tnsnames mystery
Sorry.. Windows XP.
Names.Directory_path= (TNSNAMES)
TNS_ADMIN is not set. Using the SET command did not show it in the list of variables.
-----Original Message-----
From: paul.baumgartel_at_ubs.com [mailto:paul.baumgartel_at_ubs.com] Sent: Tuesday, August 21, 2012 9:54 AM
To: Storey, Robert (DCSO); oracle-l_at_freelists.org Subject: RE: Tnsnames mystery
What kind of client machine? What's the value of NAMES.DIRECTORY_PATH in sqlnet.ora? Have you tried temporarily removing renaming your new tnsnames.ora to see what happens on tnsping?
Paul Baumgartel
Group Finance Accounting Solutions
400 Atlantic Street
Stamford, CT 06904
-----Original Message-----
From: oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org
[mailto:oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org] On Behalf Of Storey, Robert (DCSO)
Sent: Tuesday, August 21, 2012 10:49 AM
To: 'oracle-l_at_freelists.org'
Subject: Tnsnames mystery
Okay, I'm stumped. I wiped oracle off a client machine and reinstalled the 10g client. I copied over a fresh copy of a tnsnames.ora file that has all our client services with their new IP's. However, when I tnsping one of the services, I am getting IP address that were in the OLD tnsnames file. I did a file search on the machine and found no additional copies (other than the sample directory) of the tnsnames.ora file.
Where would it be getting the OLD service information from? I searched the registry and did not find it. The Tnsping file shows that it is going to the correct sql home.
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http://www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l Received on Tue Aug 21 2012 - 10:13:08 CDT


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Sony has already announced that all the Xperia smartphones launched in 2011 will be updated to the latest Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) Operating System. However, there was a long delay due to some unknown reasons. Last week, we posted that Sony finally started rolling out the much-awaited Android 4.0 update for the popular Xperia Arc S, Xperia Neo V and Xperia Ray in Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, Finland and Norway.
Sony has also promised that the company will roll out the Android 4.0 update for Xperia smartphones in other countries over the next 4-6 weeks. Xperia smartphone users in India has a reason to cheer. Sony has finally started rolling out the Android 4.0 update for the Xperia Arc S, Xperia Neo v and Xperia Ray smartphones in India.
The latest update comes with improved performance, Face Unlock, re-sizable widgets, improved web browser, new widgets, new dialer, new task switcher, improved lock screen, data Consumption monitor, quick response for incoming calls, group calendar, group Phonebook, voice search, take screenshot without any app and much more.
Sadly, this update is not available via OTA (Over-The-Air). You will need to manually update your device using the PC Companion suite. After updating the device, flash support will be disabled, but this can be easily fixed by downloading the latest Adobe Flash player from the Google Play Store.
Other Xperia smartphones such as the Xperia Arc, Xperia Play, Xperia neo, Xperia Mini, Xperia Mini Pro, Xperia Pro, Xperia Active and Sony Ericsson Live with Walkman will get the Android 4.0 update before the end of Q2 of 2012. Stay tuned for more updates!


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Thank you. Thank you so much. Vice President Biden, Mr. Chief Justice, Members of the United States Congress, distinguished guests, and fellow citizens:
Each time we gather to inaugurate a president, we bear witness to the enduring strength of our Constitution. We affirm the promise of our democracy. We recall that what binds this nation together is not the colors of our skin or the tenets of our faith or the origins of our names. What makes us exceptional – what makes us American – is our allegiance to an idea, articulated in a declaration made more than two centuries ago:
每一次我们集会庆祝总统 就职都是在见证美国宪法的持久力量。我们都是在肯定美国民主的承诺。我们重申,将这个国家紧密联系在一起的不是我们的肤色,也不是 我们信仰的教条,更不是我们名字的来源。让我们与众不同,让我们成为美国人的是我们对于一种理念的恪守。200多年前,这一理念在一篇宣言中被清晰阐述:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness."
Today we continue a never-ending journey, to bridge the meaning of those words with the realities of our time. For history tells us that while these truths may be self-evident, they have never been self-executing; that while freedom is a gift from God, it must be secured by His people here on Earth. The patriots of 1776 did not fight to replace the tyranny of a king with the privileges of a few or the rule of a mob. They gave to us a Republic, a government of, and by, and for the people, entrusting each generation to keep safe our founding creed.
今天,我们继续着这一未竟的征程,架起这些理念与我们时代现实 之间的桥梁。因为历史告诉我们,即便这些真理是不言而喻的,它们也从来不会自动生效。因为虽然自由是上帝赋予的礼物,但仍需要世间的子民去捍卫。1776年,美国的爱国先驱们不是只为了推翻国王的暴政而战,也不是为赢得少数人的特权,建立暴民的 统治。先驱们留给我们一个共和国,一个民有、民治、民享的政府。他们委托每一代美国人捍卫我们的建国信条。
For more than two hundred years, we have.


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A Ride to Roswell & back Part II (To Tucson via the Scenic Route)
In Part I, we took the most expeditious route between Tucson and Roswell. I have been back and forth to Roswell many times over the years (I have family in Roswell.) but have only travelled on the routes described in Part I. I decided that it was high time for me to try something a bit different. A friend had told me about NM Route 152 and how amazing it was (Thanks, Sean) so I plotted a route that would get there. Route 152 intersects I-25 at least 60 miles north of Las Cruces, so it made no sense to go that far south, then back back to the north, so I began looking for roads north of Alamogordo and Ruidoso. That was when I discovered NM-380.
NM-380 actually goes through Roswell and I remember seeing the junction for it along US-70 and had always wondered where it went. Let's find out. It required almost 50 miles of backtracking along US-70 to get to the 380 junction. This was awesome because it involved going back along the Hondo River Valley. I did this early in the morning and it was absolutely gorgeous. Again I got to pass through the tiny little hamlets along the valley floor.
As soon as you merge on to NM-380, there is a historical monument. There is an informational sign there telling about the Hondo River Valley, on one side, and Lincoln County and the connection between the Lincoln Country War and Billy the Kid, on the other. This was a great stop for me, because I have a lot of family history in Lincoln County.
NM-380 tracks mostly northwest and along the Bonito River Vally. It is almost as pretty as the Hondo. 10 beautiful miles later, you arrive in the historic town of Lincoln. Lincoln is the old stomping grounds of Billy the Kid. Lincoln is where Billy escaped from jail, then shot and killed a deputy and Marshall Bob Ollinger. There are quite a few historic structures here including the torreon as well as the Wortley Hotel (Please click the link and read their homepage. It is hysterical.)
About 12 miles further along NM-380 is the little town of Capitan, best known as the home and final resting place of Smokey Bear. (See you learned something here, today.) Capitan is about 70 miles from Roswell and is a great stopping place. The Smokey Bear Park is very pretty and I couldn't resist stopping in at the Smokey Bear Restaurant for breakfast. With a population of only about 1500, it doesn't take too long to look around town.
Continuing west on NM-380 takes you down out of the mountains to the high desert of the Tularosa Basin. 20 miles down the road brings you to the tiny crossroads village of Carrizoza (pop 1000). This where NM-380 intersects with US-54. A left turn here will take you back to Alamogordo. There is food and fuel available here, including a drive-in that welcomes bikers.
Just after leaving Carrizozo, you will begin seeing signs for a state park called Valley of Fires. I was thinking it had something to do with large gatherings of native Americans or some such thing and was quite astonished when we came over a little hill and saw the black, formerly molten lava flow that extends for 45 miles down this valley. I did not stop at the park, but hope to the next time I pass this way.
The next 65 miles take up, down and through rolling hills and small valleys, skirting the northern border of the White Sands Missile Range. As you reach the end of this section of NM-380, you, again, cross the Rio Grande (as we did in Las Cruces) and into San Antonio, NM. There isn't much change that you will mistake this San Antonio for the one in Texas, but there is one tiny Fina gas station, aka the San Antonio General Store, a pretty church and at least one bar.
My route turned south from here, but if you have any needs that cannot be met in San Antonio, Socorro is less than 10 miles north, along I-25. With a population of almost 10k, there are several hotels, quite a few restaurants and other retail establishments to meet your needs. Socorro, is also where you can find the junction with US-60. It also home to the NM Institute of Mining & Technology, best know for one of the places where the "Myth Busters" love to go to blow stuff up.
Back to San Antonio. I-25 is the fastest way to our next stop, but that is way too easy and way too bland for me. NM Highway #1 (aka old US-85) runs parallel to the interstate. It is about 65 very scenic miles to Truth or Consequences on Hwy 1. There are no towns, but there is a wildlife refuge, a slower pace, no traffic and some great views of Elephant Butte Lake. I was surprised, but road quality of Hwy 1 is very good. Another advantage over I-25, especially if you are on 2 wheels, is that there no "High Wind Advisory" bridge crossings. Hwy 1 crosses the washes and valley much nearer the bottom than I-25 so you don't get the high winds.
You do, eventually have to join I-25, but it is only 8 miles until you can exit on Rt 181 and go into Truth or Consequences (aka TorC.) TorC was called Hot Springs until 1950, when the city fathers took up a TV hosts wagers to rename a city after his game show. With a population of about 7000, you should have no problems finding food, fuel, lodging or services. If you like water-related activities, Elephant Butte State Park is next door and has plenty to offer. there is also a very nice veteran's memorial park with a museum.
If you are thinking of making this ride back to Tucson a 2-day trip, Truth or Consequence with the lake and hot springs nearby, is a good choice. You are about 220 miles into the trip. If it's a little too soon to stop, Silver City, NM, another 90 miles, is your other best option. After some of the most amazing road I've ever ridden, Silver City is our next stop, but first County Rd 152.
A friend had told me about this amazing road out east of Silver City. After scanning through Google Maps, I found County Rd 152 (hereafter referred to as CR152.) Again, the quickest way to CR152 from TorC is 17.5 miles south on I-25, but why do that when you can take County Road 187 out of Tor C. It is less than 2 miles longer and certainly a prettier drive.
The first 13 miles or so of CR152 are mostly flat with mountains visible on every horizon, especially in front of you as you're headed east. This is also open range for cattle, a concept which was pressed home when i popped over a hill and the was a large heifer standing in my half of the road. Around the 13 or 14 mile point, you drop into a lovely little canyon, then start to climb the mountains known as the Black Range or the Devil's Mountains.
A mile or two after dropping into the canyon, you pass through the village of Hillsboro, which is listed as a "semi-ghost town." There is no fuel here, but there is at least one little cafe' a church and a hotel. I didn't get the chance to spend anytime here, but I will next time.
9 miles later, you pass by Kingston, NM. Take a bit and visit. There is a beautiful lodge here, called the Black Range Lodge. I've never been there, but after doing the research for this post, I am seriously considering it. Kingston is also home to the Spit & Whittle Club. (What a great name for a social club.)
A mile or so east of Kingston, on CR152, is their cemetery. I love visiting old cemeteries and this one did not disappoint. It is where I got to "meet" my first Medal of honor winner. You'll see it on the north side of the road outside of Kingston.
It is soon after passing Kingston, that you begin my favorite part of this trip; the climb to Emory Pass. In just 8 miles, the road climbs from 6000 feet elevation at Kingston, to 8900 feet at Emory Pass. This 8 miles is amazing. You climb from a pinion/juniper forest at Kingston, to Ponderosa pines as you near the top of the pass. There are numerous switchbacks and tight S-curves. The speed limit is 25mph and this is too fast at times.
ADVISORY: CR152 can be exceedingly dangerous in the winter. It routinely gets snow and regular signs will tell you that it is NOT plowed at night or on weekends. Please plan your trip accordingly. Also, watch for debris in the roads. I came across numerous areas of sand and rocks in the road.
There is a nice little rest stop at the top of the pass with great photo opportunities. The road down the other side is more of those fun switch backs and S-curves. About 18 miles later, now out of the twisty parts, you meet the junction with CR61 at San Lorenzo. Going south here would take you to Deming. Continue on CR152 toward Silver City. 10 miles later, you'll come to the El Chino aka Santa Rita copper mine, once the largest open pit mine in the world. There is a nice viewing area with a lot of informational/historical signs and pictures on the south side of the road.
The incredibly scenic CR152 ends 6 miles later when you merge with NM-180 at the town of Santa Clara, which actually known as Central, until 1996 when they changed their name. (What is it with towns in NM changing their names?) The thing I most remember about riding through Santa Clara was their sign for the "Bataan Death March Recreational Park." That name struck me as a bit, uh, odd, macabre and slightly disturbing, but memorable. Too bad, I didn't get a pic.
from here, it is only 8 miles to downtown Silver City. There is a wonderful main street area which makes you feel like you're in an old movie. At this point you have travelled about 300 miles from Roswell. If you did not spend the night in TorC, you might want to consider staying in Silver City. With a population of 10k, and a great mountain location, there is plenty to see and do here.
From Silver City, there are 2 primary ways to get back to Tucson. the one I most recommend is taking NM-180 to CR-78. This, too, is another amazing road. I wrote about this in September, 2011 (SIR's to NM and Back Again.) The other way is to take CR-90 out of the south side of town. This takes you through some beautiful pinyon forest, across the Burro Mountains and through the Gila National Forest.
Approximately 45 miles, you'll reach the junction with US-70 then you come in to the north side of Lordsburg. Since I already covered I-10 from Tucson to Lordsburg, I will end this lengthy post here. Although, I did not spend a lot of space writing about it, CR152, is one of the most beautiful and exciting roads on which I have ever ridden. I hope you get a chance to go there in one kind of vehicle or another.
I am hoping to put together a two or even three day ride to this area in the spring of next year. I hope some of my scooter brethren will be able to accompany me.
5 Responses to "A Ride to Roswell & back Part II (To Tucson via the Scenic Route)"
Excellent article. The photographs were wonderful. I've made this ride many times and always considerate one of my favorites. Your writing is wonderful and entertaining and you should consider submitting your article to one of the national motorcycle publications for publication nationally. Wonderful job. Thank you for sharing!
Let me know when you are planning your spring adventure. I would like to be considered for the trip. It will be a first for me. After looking at your pics, it looks like a bucket list inclusion. Jim.
Stunning scenery – I'll have to make the trip sometime.


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What an incredibly beautiful kitty you are: With that lovely long fur in an unusual tortie shade, with your big eyes- and you are just as beautiful inside and seem to have not as much tortietude as could be expected
Even when you wear your summer haircut you look so cute that it is no surprise everyone wants to cuddle with you. I also could not resist giving you tummy rubs when you roll on the floor showing your cute little tongue.
And your doggie friend looks very pretty too- one can really see you have the purrfect family.
Congratulations on being cat of the day today- you know you deserve some extra treats